E rere rā ngā wai o Waihīrere he wai rurutu roimata nā te Toihau Hauora, Hauātanga ki te taniwha hikuroa ki a Maaka Tibble.
He ripa tauarai kia koe e te Rangatira e Maaka, koe e takahi nei i te ara o nui mā o roa mā o ngō tūpuna mātua i te pō.
Kāti tēnei kakahu taratara, kakahu pekepeke kua tau ki runga kia koe e te Pouaru Roberta hurinoa ngā kōrua Tamariki mokopuna.
The Health and Disability Commissioner (HDC) acknowledges the passing of Matua Maaka Tibble (Ngāti Porou) MNZM and his lifelong dedication and service to tāngata whaikaha | disabled people in Aotearoa.
Mātua Maaka was a founding member of Kāpō Māori Aotearoa (the first kaupapa Māori disabled persons organisation, for blind Māori), and a founding member of Whaia te Ao Marama the Ministry of Health’s Māori Disability Leadership Group.
As well as his deep involvement in disability, Matua Maaka was also a leader in the health sector, having been elected to the Tairāwhiti District Health Board and appointed to the National Health Committee.
Mātua Maaka is widely known as having gifted ‘whaikaha’ or ‘tāngata whaikaha’ to disability communities, as a strengths-based te reo term for disabled people meaning ‘people who are determined to do well’. Matua Maaka also gifted Whaikaha - Ministry of Disabled People their name, ‘Whaikaha’, when they were established in 2022.
In the 1990s, Mātua Maaka was a Sir Winston Churchill Fellow, where he completed research which compared Māori access to disability services with that of indigenous peoples in the Unites States and Canada.
In recent years, Mātua Maaka continued his work as part of the disability advisory group of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care and had a claim before the Waitangi Tribunal on behalf of all Kāpō Māori and their whānau in the Health Services and Outcomes Kaupapa Inquiry (Wai 2575).
HDC is immensely grateful to have benefitted from the wisdom and guidance of Mātua Maaka on tikanga and the experiences and aspirations of tāngata whaikaha Māori. His generosity helped shape our current work to make HDC’s Act and Code more effective for, and responsive to, the needs of Māori.
At this deeply sad time our thoughts are with the whānau of Matua Maaka and the many tāngata whaikaha and whānau hauā communities he served.
Nō reira e koro e Maaka, haere rā koe ki te rā e whiti ana, ki te ngāwaritanga o te atua kaha rawa.
Haere, haere moe iho rā koe.